Examining the validity of the family investment and stress models and relationship to children's school readiness across five cultural groups

• Published in: Journal of family psychology Vol. 26; no. 3; p. 359
• Main Authors: Iruka, Iheoma U, Laforett, Doré R, Odom, Erika C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 01.06.2012
• Subjects: Adult; African Americans - ethnology; African Americans - statistics & numerical data; Asian Americans - ethnology; Asian Americans - psychology; Child Development - physiology; Child, Preschool; Cross-Cultural Comparison; Ethnic Groups - ethnology; Ethnic Groups - psychology; European Continental Ancestry Group - ethnology; European Continental Ancestry Group - psychology; Family Characteristics - ethnology; Female; Hispanic Americans - ethnology; Hispanic Americans - psychology; Humans; Infant; Male; Models, Psychological; Parent-Child Relations - ethnology; Parenting - ethnology; Parenting - psychology; Reproducibility of Results; Stress, Psychological - ethnology; Stress, Psychological - psychology; United States - ethnology; United States
• ISSN: 1939-1293
• DOI: 10.1037/a0028290

Using the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort (ECLS-B) dataset, this study examined whether the family investment and the family stress models generalized to non-European American (EA) families. Specifically, we examined whether parenting processes mediated the association between family demographics and children's school readiness, and whether the pathways vary across cultural groups. Both models were most salient for EAs followed by African Americans (AAs) and Spanish-speaking Hispanics, but less so for English-speaking Hispanics (EHs) and Asian Americans. Findings indicated that sensitive parenting was a salient mediator between family demographics and children's school readiness for all groups except EHs; negative parenting and parent-child activities were salient mediators for EAs only.